Archive for Category: "Movies"

There are a ton of exciting movies out right now — some are better than others. (Sounds like a premise for future power rankings!!!!!!)

For help planning out your winter movie budget, here is a primer to two epics. First, Spielberg’s Lincoln, then Hollywood’s adaptation of Life of Pi.

I don’t have to tell you — everyone is saying it — they might as well just announce the Best Actor award at the Oscars already. Daniel Day-Lewis does a freaky good Lincoln, adding so much tenderness, thoughtfulness and dimension to one of the most complex American presidents.

Avatar set the standard for 3D CGI-heavy filmmaking, yes. Life of Pi matches or exceeds Avatar. Consider the challenge for the director, Ang Lee: well more than 50 percent of the film revolves around interplay between a teenager… and a tiger… alone… in the Pacific Ocean.

Here’s why: movies like Skyfall are rebooting the action genre, which of course includes the James Bond series. Bond movies will no longer be formulaic flicks with pithy pick-up lines, vapid women and happy endings; the new Bond is flawed, injured, cynical, self-loathing, and even — occasionally — out-matched.

Bond is one thing, but it will not be contending for Oscars next March. (Although co-star Javier Bardem might.) The movie it topped at the box office this weekend — Ben Affleck’s Argo — most certainly will.

It’s hard to explain what’s so great about Argo until you see it. In brief, Argo is brilliantly paced — the plot covers a lot of ground quickly — well-acted, unpredictable, occasionally hilarious, and confidently understated. After the movie was over, I quickly hoisted it into the “Best Movies I’ve Ever Watched” category. I know — bold.

So, on one hand, we have an action movie trying to be more complex; on the other, a spy movie trying to keep it simple.

Take a dash of goofy/gritty crime classic Snatch, throw in a Coen Brothers twist of nihilism, and sprinkle the disjointed (but purposeful) vignetting of Pulp Fiction. Then add a hearty helping of Christopher Walken, and you have Seven Psychopaths.

Shorter: It’s like a better version of Smoking Aces.

Seven Psychopaths is about a Los Angeles screenwriter, played by a (surprisingly?) capable Colin Farrell, whose writer’s block is mended by his homicidal homeboy (Sam Rockwell). The two end up teaming with a dog kidnapper (Walken) who steals Woody Harrelson’s shih tzu and has to suffer the consequences.

From the get-go, this movie is wildly entertaining. The humor is biting, the storytelling is suspenseful, and the character development is well-executed.

Rebounding from Maggie Gyllenhall, who wouldn’t sleep with you DESPITE KNOWING FULL WELL YOU ARE FUCKING BATMAN, to Anne Hathaway in full-body spandex. Let’s hope the girl who first played Rachel Dawes achieves a similar narrative.

Marion Cotillard. Quietly putting together one of the best resumes in Hollywood since 2009 — Inception, Midnight in Paris, Dark Knight Rises, Contagion, Public Enemies — Mademoiselle Cotillard is nailing down the “Not Bat-Shit Crazy Female Actress Who Is Not Just Hot But Can Also Act” niche previously occupied by Natalie Portman and never once occupied by Megan Fox.

Riding the wave of the Occupy movement. DKR manages to at least pay homage to the most significant cultural protest in half a century.

The Bad:

A truly ridiculous appearance by The Scarecrow, which caused the crowd in my theater to actually LOL the moment he appeared on screen. The only explanation I have for scenes with The Scarecrow are that Dark Knight Rises had to adhere to the International Law stating Cillian Murphy has to be in every Christopher Nolan movie.

Verdict: Tough to nitpick at a great movie — overall, DKR gets at least a 9 on the scale of 1-to-Dark Knight.

Five days off, unprecedented heat, way too many American-flag Budweisers and several NBA blockbuster trades are the fodder of Matt’s latest Completely Arbitrary Power Rankings.

2) My company for giving us the entire week off after July Fourth.

3) Roger Federer. Now, he’s on his way to a record eighth Wimbledon final. But a few weeks ago, many thought Roger Federer would be forever doomed to pointlessly chase the dominant Novak Djokovic and ubiquitous Rafael Nadal, like he was Quagmire chasing Lois.

Whoever Katie Holmes rebounds with. I like Channing Tatum for this role (the first role for which anyone has ever liked Tatum).

15) The Newsroom. Did anyone watch the second week? Literally, have you heard anyone talking about it since Week One?

Rome is a living, breathing city of stories in To Rome With Love — an almost magical venue for people to fall in love, make mistakes, and experiment with happiness. Woody Allen has made many cities into aphrodisiacs and he does it once more; he makes old, rusty, bustling Rome look damn sexy.

Is To Rome With Love an amazing movie? No. Is it as good as Midnight in Paris? No. Should you see it instead of Ted? Probably not, if you’re a reader of this website. But if you want to be inspired by great filmmaking, excellent acting and a timeless city, it’s worth it. Woody Allen almost always is.

Prometheus can only be described as an un-scary horror movie that purports to be “thinking” movie, whose only problem is that it was written by someone with no brain.

Everyone values different traits in movies. Some value the experience of a visually amazing film, and Prometheus is surely that.

But when you see the girl who played Lisabeth Salander in the Norweigan Dragon Tattoo films zipping Michael Fassbender’s severed, yet still-speaking head into a duffel bag, you start to wonder exactly how long the screenwriters spent developing the plot.

Prometheus’ marketing and framing seems to suggest the main question behind the film is, “Who created humans and why?” That question is fairly heavy, right? The movie starts to build toward answering that question, but goes in a totally different direction, ultimately asking, “Who are the grandparents of the alien in ‘Alien?’” (I’m serious. Keep reading.)

Sacha Baron Cohen is In the Rafters because of what he shouldn’t do. He is so willing to go anywhere for a laugh that he is truly dangerous. We never know what to expect of him. He could kiss Will Ferrell on the lips. He could kidnap Pamela Anderson. He could run through a hotel naked wrestling another naked, obese man.

You or I might get the joke, but the people who don’t are Baron Cohen’s muse. And he tests everyone extensively to see if they can’t take a joke, or at what point they become the joke themselves.

The Dictator works because Baron Cohen’s “Supreme Leader Admiral-General” Aladeen is a really complete comic character (and will be the most popular Halloween costume this year, I guarantee that). He is as brutally offensive, sexist, racist, ignorant, and vain as you should expect. The humor has Baron Cohen’s weird fingerprints all over it.

Think about how many superhero movies there have been in the last ten years. An incomplete, but wildly lengthy list: Three Batmans (pending Dark Knight Rises), two Iron Mans, two Fantastic Fours, Two Hellboys, and about 30 X-Men flicks.

With all of that superhero clutter, how do you make a good superhero movie in 2012?

Simple! Put 20 superheroes on screen together and have them all fight an army of aliens in New York City.

Other News

Matt and Neal talk NBA free agency in the return of the pod! Listen to their recap of the Eastern conference here. Then check out their recap of the Western conference, plus a few random predictions here.

Justin, Neal and Matt put the Super Bowl in context: How good are the Ravens compared to other SB winners? Is Joe Flacco a top-5 quarterback? What is the next step with PED testing in the NFL?

Once again, sports fans were treated to a memorable Super Bowl. The Ravens were thinking blowout until the blackout — did that affect their momentum? — and then the 49ers came all the way back to ultimately fall just short.

Meanwhile, reverberations of Ray Lewis’ alleged use of PED’s forced sports fans to consider their values — does PED use really matter to us?

And Joe Flacco emerged from a historic playoff run as an unquestioned franchise quarterback (what?).

Without further ado: Matt and Justin’s discussion of the NFL playoff picture leading into the end of the regular season, with special guest Neal Suidan.

All you have to do is click here and click “Listen” or “Download” once you get to our hosting site.

Our first post is about the NFC Playoff picture leading into last week’s games. Listen to how wrong we were about San Francisco after last night’s result, Neal’s analysis of his hometown Bears (and Bulls), Matt’s pipe-dream of a Redskins playoff run and more.

Our next pod is about the AFC, but includes a bonus round of which coaches should get fired (and Matt’s prediction of Chip Kelly to Carolina that he has been patting himself on the back for ever since), and Neal trying to Beautiful Mind his way through the muddy AFC North playoff picture. Justin’s breakdown of the Raiders, fortunately for you all, was omitted due to “microphone problems.”

Shortly, these episodes will be available on the iTunes store (Apple has to screen them first before they unleash our idiocy on the unwashed masses).

Watching RGIII as a rookie is like the first time you heard OK Computer, or saw Louis CK’s standup a few years ago, or watched Barack Obama in the 2004 Democratic Convention. “Holy shit!” you think. “Do people know about this yet?”

You form a special kind of relationship with an entertainer, athlete or politician after an experience like that — you realize: “Hey, this guy could be the real deal, and I think I just saw history.” Often, I find I become invested in people like that, rooting for history just to say in a few years, “I was there…”

RGIII to the rescue. He is, by many accounts, the most exciting player in the league. He draws friendly fans to FedEx Field. His value to a shrinking fan base is unspeakable. It’s hard to root against him, even if your team is playing against him.

Robert Griffin III has revitalized one of the most valuable franchises in the world. The value of hope is what Griffin brings to the table, in addition to all those other tangible assets.